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Please help me! I want to make the White Bean Enchiladas (Nov) tonight for tomorrow's dinner, but my grocery store didn't have enchilada sauce! I'm not even really sure what it is, so I don't know what to substitute. I have some taco sauce (thin, red, mildly spicy stuff - not chunky) and I have salsa. Would either of these do it? Or maybe a mix of the two?

Hi Jen. Enchilada sauce is sold in a can, in the 10oz. amount specified in that recipe (which by the way was excellent!). Obviously, you'll find it buried somewhere in the Mexican section of the grocery store.
As for the taco sauce, in a pinch it would probably do, but I believe enchilada sauce is somewhat thicker than taco sauce. Good luck.

I checked the entire Mexican foods section, and I'm pretty sure my store doesn't carry it. Sometimes I have trouble getting some of the ingredients in CL here, even though I live in a very large, multicultural city. I'm not sure why, but it's very frustrating! Normally I'd go to a Mexican store to find some, but I wanted to make this tonight! Maybe I'll try a mix of the taco sauce and salsa...if I blend the two together it may make a thicker sauce. I'll keep my fingers crossed!

Please don't substitute taco sauce and salsa. Depending upon the product you're using, you may not get anywhere close. What you're looking for may also be marketed as red chile sauce. Ingredients should include not more then red chiles, water, garlic, spices--sometimes oil or vinegar.

Jen - I KNEW you must be a canuck - we just don't get the good stuff here - you wouldn't believe the trouble and goingings-on I had to buy 'chipotle peppers' - ended up at a very 'elite' grocery store - at $4.99 a tin for these peppers - I can't find 'enchilada sauce' in Toronto either - WE ARE SO DEPRIVED!!!! heheheh

I know Lanie...it's frustrating sometimes! But of course, as mentioned on a previous thread, we have all kinds of great Canadian secrets too...like Nanaimo bars!

I think after all this response it looks like I really do need the enchilada sauce...I'll have to call around tomorrow and see if there's somewhere I can pick it up on my way home. I was trying to be so organized and have it done ahead of time! Oh well.

Now I have another question: what's the difference between red and green enchilada sauce? Is the red just hotter than the green? I was able to find some, but only the green kind (and in a 20 oz can, not 10 oz). I'll have to substitute the green - can I add extra green chiles, or maybe add some cayenne or something? Any suggestions?

SusanL and emilycat, Nanaimo bars aren't really a secret...it just seems that hardly any Americans know about them! And they were invented in Canada, I believe. They're very popular here - every grocery store sells them by the panful, and they show up at every potluck/buffet table/etc. Anyway, I'll post my yummy Nanaimo bar recipe on that thread when I get home tonight! (If I can find it!)

Check the ingredients on the can. Red enchilada sauce is made from red chiles; the green generally comes from a mixture of tomatillo-- green tomatoes-- and green chiles. They have distinctly different tastes and may not be used interchangeably.

Sorry.

--

Oops! I got called away by the electrician before I could answer the other question.

I have two suggestions here. Either, you can make the recipe with your green sauce without adding anything else (after all, we do make enchiladas with green sauce) or you can make your own sauce using one of the posted recipes. Obviously, using the green sauce in place of the red will change the nature of the dish, but who knows? Maybe it won't be a bad thing...

Thanks, Jen!
I'll have to compare your recipe to mine and see how authenic mine really is! I have to say that I've never made them myself; I had them when a friend's mother brought them to a mother-daughter cookie tea that we hosted when I was in, gosh, I think the 8th grade.
It was so much fun...if any of you have daughters who like that kind of stuff, you should really think about organizing one at your home. I really loved it, even when I was in the "parents aren't cool" stage.